Apple Video Shows iPad Flash Support, But Don’t Believe It

Some of Apple’s promotional material about the iPad implies the device’s Safari browser can load Adobe Flash content. However, demonstration units of the tablet, including the one presented by Steve Jobs, could not, and a consumer has already filed a complaint to the Federal Trade Commission alleging false advertising.

9to5Mac’s Seth Weintraub noticed that a Flash-based section of the NYTimes.com front page appears to load properly in the video above. The “Video” section of NYTimes.com that loads around the 1:15 mark is normally a piece of Flash content. Weintraub points out that the rendering and the resolution independence makes it look like the iPad really is loading Flash.

But that’s unlikely to be the case. If the iPad really did support Flash, it would be quite odd. Steve Jobs made no mention of Flash during Wednesday’s tablet event, and you would think he would highlight that since the lack of Flash for the iPhone remains an incessant complaint among customers.

Also, when Jobs demonstrated the tablet and showed NYTimes.com in the browser, it clearly reveals a missing chunk for where the Flash content is supposed to be. (Check out the keynote video at Apple’s website at the 13:10 mark.)

First noted by AppleInsider, a second example where Flash appears to be working on the iPad is a press image (right). It depicts an NYTimes.com slideshow that would require Flash support.

Adobe has already reacted to the iPad’s lack of Flash support, and you would think the company would know if Apple was really going to put Flash in the tablet. So while consumers can wish for adequate Flash support on the iPhone and the iPad, in the near term this seems like a pipe dream.

Paul Threatt, a graphic designer at Jackson Walker design group, has filed a complaint to the FTC alleging false advertising. His statement reads:

On the Apple iPad, iPhone, and iPod Touch devices, Apple provides a proprietary web browser named Safari. On these electronic devices, Apple computer does not support the web browser extension commonly referred to as “Flash”. The Adobe Flash extension is a popular browser plug-in that has gained wide popularity due to its ability to easily display video and image based slideshows on the web.

In several advertisements and images representing the apple products in question, Apple has purposefully elected to show these devices correctly displaying content that necessitates the Adobe Flash plug-in. This is not possible on the actual devices, and Apple is very aware of that fact. Despite the controversial lack of support for Adobe Flash on these devices, Apple has elected to depict these correctly utilizing the Flash plug-in. This constitutes willful false advertising and Apple’s advertising practices for the iPhone, iPod Touch, and the new iPad should be forcibly changed.

“I’m a huge Apple loyalist, so it kind of annoys me that they’re going and doing stuff like this,” Threatt told Wired.com. “Unless they’ve got something up their sleeve to actually give us Flash, it seems like false advertising in a big way.”

Apple did not immediately respond to a request for comment regarding Flash support or Threatt’s complaint.

Flash has already gotten Apple in trouble in the past. In the U.K., two customers complained that Apple was falsely advertising the iPhone in a TV commercial by saying “all the parts of the internet are on the iPhone” when the handset does not support Flash. The U.K.’s Advertising Standards Authority deemed the ad misleading and pulled the ad.

In November 2008, Wired.com explained why it’s unlikely Apple will support Flash on the iPhone. We pointed out Flash was not allowed in the iPhone developers’ terms of service agreement, which stated, “An Application may not itself install or launch other executable code by any means, including without limitation through the use of a plug-in architecture, calling other frameworks, other APIs or otherwise…. No interpreted code may be downloaded and used in an Application except for code that is interpreted and run by Apple’s Published APIs and built-in interpreter(s).” (I don’t have access to the latest iPhone developers’ TOS agreement because it’s under strict NDA, but I doubt that clause has changed.)

We also noted allowing Flash would open doors to content that competes with apps in the App Store, so it would probably be in Apple’s best interest to shy away from the platform. Lastly, Flash would potentially introduce a slew of performance problems as well. Flash has been known for sporadic crashing and quickly depleting battery life, as well as security risks, which amount to many potential headaches for Apple.

Updated 1/30/10, 11 a.m. PDT: Apple has removed the image of the iPad showing the NYTimes.com slideshow from its home page. Apple has also updated its promotional video to show a missing chunk on NYTimes.com to reveal the lack of Flash support.

Updated 1:45 p.m. PDT: Weintraub has posted more information: “We’ve just got word from our source at Chiat/Day Media Arts Lab that they make fake optimized web pages for all of Apple’s commercials — which load faster. In this case they made optimized images to take the place of Flash and are redoing them as we speak.”